Trinity Mirror hit by September ad slump

Trinity Mirror reports that ad revenue fell 4.6% on an adjusted basis year on year in the 17 weeks to 31 October, as the publisher's national and regional newspaper divisions suffered a poor September in particular.

Stripping out the impact of the acquisition of GMG Regional Media, which it bought in March, to give a true performance comparison, total group revenue fell 5.4% year on year for the period. The company said that if September were stripped from the figures, total ad revenue would have fallen by 3.4% – an improvement of 0.7% on the declines registered in the first half of the year.

Trinity Mirror admitted ad revenues in September were "below recent trends" but said there had been an improvement in the rate ad revenue declined in October to 2%.

Total circulation revenues fell 6.7% on an adjusted basis, while group digital revenues declined 2.4% in the period.

Trinity Mirror's regional division saw ad revenues decline by 6.7% on an adjusted basis, an improvement on the 8% fall recorded in the first half of the year. Regional circulation revenues fell 7.1% on an adjusted basis, with digital revenues down 3.3%.

The national newspaper division, home of the Daily Mirror, saw an ad revenue decline of 1.3%. The company said this was fuelled by a 5.9% fall in September which, if it were excluded, would have seen a rise of 0.8% for the period. National circulation revenues declined 6.5% on an adjusted basis, with digital revenues for the division up 3.1%.

The publisher said that trading has remained "volatile due to the fragile economic environment and the uncertainty resulting from the government spending review".

However Trinity Mirror said it remained "confident" that the company will "deliver a robust performance" in 2010 in line with expectations.

"The board envisages that the trading environment will remain challenging over the remainder of the year and into 2011, however, it anticipates that the rate of decline in revenues will improve," the company said.

Trinity Mirror said it was on track to deliver £25m in "structural cost savings" with the total cost base on target to be reduced by about £60m this year. The company said that while overall newsprint prices for 2010 will show a year-on-year cost decrease, prices in the second half have increased and there is "further pricing pressure anticipated for 2011".

Net debt stands at £288m.

Trinity Mirror's share price dropped by more than 14% in early trading.

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About this article

Trinity Mirror hit by September ad slump

This article was published on
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at 04.11 EST on Thursday 11 November 2010.
It was last modified at 23.51 EDT on Monday 19 May 2014.
It was first published at 03.44 EST on Thursday 11 November 2010.